Comparing Josephson's Mother Jones And Cesar Chavez

You have probably spent your day sitting in a classroom, learning important facts so that you can go to college or get a good job after you graduate from high school. But if you had been born one hundred years ago, you might have ended up working long and hard for meager wages in a factory. Similarly, if you had been born fifty or seventy-five years ago, you might have wound up working in the fields of California instead of getting a good education. Life was unfair for a lot of workers in the early-to-mid-twentieth century, especially for children and migrant farm workers. Two people, however, worked hard to change all that—Mary Harris “Mother” Jones and Cesar Chavez. Both championed the rights of workers and called for laws that guaranteed

As Josephson says in paragraph 4, even though it was against the law to hire children younger than 13 to work in factories, “parents often lied about a child’s age,” and “[m]ill owners “looked the other way, because child labor was cheap.” As a result, thousands of children worked long hours under terrible working conditions in mills, with often serious effects to their health. To highlight this point, Josephson notes, in paragraph 3, how Mother Jones noticed that the children’s “bodies were bone-thin with hollow chests,” and that many of them were maimed, “with their hands [cut] off, some with the thumb missing.” The writer explains how Jones led a group of mill children and their parents to Independence Square in Philadelphia, where she called on city officials to think about the real costs of child labor—mangled limbs, lost childhoods, no education. Jones appealed to their sympathies, stating in paragraph 6: “‘Philadelphia’s mansions were built on the broken bones, the quivering hearts, and the drooping heads of these children.’” But the officials ignored her. Undeterred, she decided that the best way to bring national attention to the plight of child labor was to march 125 miles to President Theodore Roosevelt’s summer home in New York. She and

In the first paragraph, these authors from the Cesar Chavez Foundation quote Robert F. Kennedy by saying that he called Chavez “‘one of the heroic figures of our time.’” They begin their text by introducing Chavez as a “true American hero,” a “farm labor leader ...a community organizer ...and a crusader for the environment and consumer rights.” Later, in paragraph 15, they refer to him as a “unique and humble leader, as well as a great humanitarian and communicator who influenced and inspired millions of Americans from all walks of life.” In paragraph 19, they call him “a common man with an uncommon vision.” They support their claims with relevant textual evidence of Chavez’s achievements. In paragraph 2, they describe how as a boy, he worked in California’s “fields, orchards, and vineyards, where he was exposed to the hardships and injustices of farm worker life.” Most of the selection explores Chavez’s accomplishments as a leader of the migrant labor movement. The authors outline the specifics of Chavez’s achievements, on behalf of migrant workers, including the right to form and join unions, such as the United Farm Workers (the UFW), and create contracts that provided rest periods, safe working conditions, clean drinking water, medical care, and pensions. They also point out that he helped to outlaw dangerous pesticides and job discrimination. More importantly, Chavez